Four GOP senators have called on Secretary of State Antony Blinken to stop U.S. funding for a nongovernmental organization that has been accused of influencing the protests against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s proposed changes to Israel’s judiciary—including its Supreme Court.
The April 4 letter was signed by Sens. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.), Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.).
“We write to urge the State Department to immediately cease funding the Movement for Quality Government [MOG] and all other partisan organizations in Israel, which undermines one of our strongest allies and interferes in their democracy,” they wrote.
“In spite of longstanding U.S. practice to refrain from funding foreign partisan organizations, the State Department has confirmed that it has sent over $38,000 to MOG, an Israeli nonprofit that has helped to organize—and has participated in—political protests against proposed legislation from Israel’s democratically-elected legislature,” continued the senators.
The State Department has repeatedly denied the allegation that it has funded protests against the proposed changes, which include allowing the government to appoint judges and for the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, to overturn Supreme Court decisions.
“These accusations are completely and demonstrably false,” said the department’s principal deputy press secretary, Vedant Patel, on March 27.
“The Movement of Quality Government is [an] NGO, and it received a modest grant from the State Department that was initiated during the previous administration, and the latest disbursal of funds came in September of 2022, prior to the most recent Israeli elections.
“And this grant supported an educational program for Jerusalem schools that supplemented their civic studies curriculum.”
Patel reiterated his statement two days later.
Netanyahu announced on March 27 a pause in the effort to change Israel’s judiciary until the next legislative session, which will be after Passover.
In Israel, Passover started on April 5 and ends on April 12 (April 13 outside of Israel).
In their letter, the senators also decried the State Department for allegedly giving more than $300,000 to Israeli NGO OneVoice in their unsuccessful campaign against Netanyahu’s 2015 election.
“This pattern of the State Department funding partisan organizations in an allied democracy is unacceptable,” they wrote. “It makes no difference which side of the political divide a given organization is aligned with.
“If the government of a U.S. partner or ally was funding partisan organizations in the United States, we would rightly find such foreign interference in our democracy unacceptable.
“The United States must stand with our allies and partners around the world—not undermine them.”
The senators asked Blinken to respond by April 18 “with a promise that the department will cease such funding and will never fund another partisan organization in Israel again.”
The Epoch Times has reached out to the State Department for comment on the letter.